


Xincalan Romance

by Willow_River



Category: Thrilling Intent (Web Series)
Genre: Not Canon Compliant, Other, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-02
Updated: 2016-09-02
Packaged: 2018-08-12 13:14:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,478
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7936108
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Willow_River/pseuds/Willow_River
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Due to certain conversations, I decided to write a silly romance novel-esque idea of maybe how Zalvetta's parents would have met.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Xincalan Romance

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is working off the old, now debunct, theory that Zalvetta was a half-spirit.

The warrior stalked through the trees as silent as an owl’s wings. All around then, the rest of their squad did the same. Just ahead was a caravan. Their target. Moonlight illuminated what the lantern light failed to and the humans leading the caravan showed no troubles navigating the road.

The warrior watched from the bushes for a minute. It was like a game, hiding from the humans until the time was right. At the squad leader’s signal, they leapt from the foliage and attacked the nearest human. They went down quickly, as did the next. The warrior turned towards their next victim, but was given pause at the sight.

Standing before them was a young woman. She was lithe and beautiful in the traditional sense, with hair that seemed to shimmer gold in the moonlight. She wielded a sword taken off one of the fallen caravan guards, but held it amaturely, as if she’d never held a weapon before in her life. Her eyes were filled with determination, however, and the warrior was certain that she wouldn’t hesitate to give her all in a fight for her life.

Then the warrior was distracted. Another human came up from behind and attempted to strangle them. They threw the human off their back and turned to make their escape. The rest of their squad had finished looting the caravan, there was no further reason to stay. As they disappeared into the brush, however, something compelled them to turn back. The woman was running around now, helping her companions, though she did not drop the sword.

It was curious, the warrior thought, how her eyes hadn’t shown any fear at the sight of them. There was no hatred either. Only the will to live. Not something they had seen before in the humans of Xincala.

A few nights later, the warrior was sent to raid a small village near Xincala. There she was again, staring out a window at the stars while their comrades silently pilfered the village’s storehouse. She didn’t know about what was happening. As far as she knew, it was just another quiet night. An owl hooted nearby, and the woman smiled and hooted back, as if she thought she could communicate with the creature. This amused the warrior.

They crept nearer. They wanted to see her eyes again. Such lovely green pools they had been. They wondered how her eyes would look under the pure starlight.

A branch snapped.

The woman’s head whipped to face them, her eyes looking right at their mask. They froze. The two regarded each other for a moment, neither moving, until the warrior tried to slip back into the shadows.

“You don’t have to leave,” she spoke. Surprisingly, she sounded almost disappointed. “I don’t mind you being here, if you aren’t here to hurt anyone. I promise not to sound the alarm.”

The warrior paused, then moved forward slightly, still remaining mostly hidden in the foliage.

“The ban don’t talk much do they?” She sighed. “It’s nice to have somebody to talk to who doesn’t cut me off, though. Everyone here seems to not notice me very much. You know, I tried running away a few days ago. I didn’t get very far, since some of your friends attacked the caravan I was with, but no one here even noticed I had been gone. Can you imagine? Not even my own parents… I’ll bet you could have killed me that night and they wouldn’t have even cared.”

There was silence for a few moments. A cloud rolled over them, obscuring everything in shadow. The warrior heard the rest of their squad moving back into the forest. It was time for them to go. They turned away from the woman, just as the sky came back into view.

“Oh, you’re leaving?” There was that disappointment again in her voice. The warrior paused and gave a single nod. “I see. Well… You can come again, if you like. I like having someone to talk to who listens.”

The warrior vanished into the trees.

Days passed and the warrior tried to forget the golden-haired woman, but they just couldn’t get her out of their head. One night, the warrior returned to the village. There she was again, sighing at the stars and listening to the singing of crickets.

The warrior moved closer. There was sadness in the woman’s eyes.

“You came back,” she exclaimed. “I didn’t think you would.”

The two spent the night at the window, the warrior listening as the woman talked to them about everything from her favourite place to sneak away during the day, to how worried she was for this season’s crop considering the drought, to what the stars reminded her of.

They spent the next night in much the same way. And the next.

It continued on like this for some time. The warrior admired how the woman’s face lit up whenever they appeared, loved to listen to her voice. Some nights the woman would climb out of her window and the pair would walk to a nearby empty field to stare up at the stars.

“I realized we don’t know each other’s names,” she said one day. “It’s rather rude of me, not introducing myself sooner. My name is Fi Lomina Nanna, but you can just call me Mina. What’s your name?” She tilted her head in curiosity, much like a bird.

The warrior smiled beneath their mask, then frowned. They considered how to approach the situation. The mask prevented them from speaking. They could always draw in a patch of dirt, but there wasn’t any close by. Removing the mask… well, Xin had already begun questioning their midnight escapades, might as well go whole hog and take the mask off. If it was for Mina, they didn’t mind whatever the consequences to come later may be.

They reached up to the mask, pressing on it with both hands as hard as they could until it cracked. They could feel the magic that bound the mask to them fade and they pulled it off, revealing warm amber eyes and a strong jaw framed by messy light brown hair.

“My name is Keranimos. You may call me Kera, if you like.”

Mina smiled. “It’s nice to properly meet you, Kera.”

Xin did give the warrior a hard time about their mask, but there had been a playful spark in his eyes. The god of rebirth always seemed to know what was going on, and while he did remind the warrior to be careful, he never outright told them to stop their escapades.

Keranimos continued to visit Mina with increasing frequency. It soon felt more normal to spend nights talking with her than it did to be in the village with their comrades.

“My father’s forcing me to get married,” Mina told him one night from her window, her cheek still red from the slap her father had dealt her not minutes before. “I don’t even like him. How am I supposed to marry him?”

“You could try running away,” the warrior suggested, even as their heart ached at the thought of her leaving.

“Heh, because that worked so well the last time…. You could take me with you.” Her eyes looked up to them hopefully. “Father would never find me with the ban and… I’d like to learn more about you.”

The warrior’s heart soared. “When-” they cleared their throat, “when would you like to leave?”

Mina looked behind her. “Let’s go right now. Help me out?” She reached her arms out to the warrior as she climbed through the window and they lifted her out and placed her on the grass.

There was a clamour from inside the house. Keranimos could suddenly see a burly figure, backlit by lamplight, running towards the window and shouting, “Unhand my daughter, you filthy ban!”

The pair took off into the woods, the shouts of Mina’s father chasing them. Trees whipped past them as they jumped over roots and stones, and ducked beneath low branches. Their path was long and convoluted as Mina's father refused to lose any ground. Eventually, the warrior had to carry Mina, who was unused to running so much.

“Your father is quite tenacious,” they commented.

“Yes, very,” Mina agreed, looking over her shoulder to check how far apart they were. “Did I mention he’s part of the village militia? He hates the ban with a passion.”

“You might have said a word or two about that at one point.”

They eventually outran the man and the warrior led the woman to a grove. There, they drew a rune of some sort on the bark of a tree that had a hollow arch going through its centre.

“This way,” they guided Mina, gently taking her hand and pulling her through the portal. “Welcome to the ban village.”


End file.
